Raiders sweep Blades out of second round, move on to face Tigers

Then at 4:54, the Raiders got a little more puck luck that they earned with a good cycle first. The puck eventually made its way back to Max Heise in the middle of the blueline, he passed right to Brock Cripps, and he fired towards the goal with two Raiders in front. Maddix McCagherty was battling for position, but his skate was in the right spot to deflect in his first of the playoffs.

After that we got one of the most finessed goals of the night from one of the most unlikely sources. Evan Smith started the play with a behind his back pass to the left wall for Riley Boychuk. As the play went down low and the Raiders defence changed, Boychuk stopped on the half wall and waited for his fresh defencemen to enter the play, and he fed Matyas Man in the middle of the blueline with room to skate. He found a window down low through two Blades defenders, skated in towards the corner, then turned a fired a short side wrist shot for his second of the playoffs at 6:12, tying the amount of goals he scored during the season.

It took 38 seconds, but the Blades finally got some puck luck of their own. At 6:40, a shot from David Lewandowski would get deflected in off a Raider defender, and the Blades were on the board for the first time in three games.

At the 17:03 mark however, the Raiders scored again. Brayden Dube earned the first assist with a feed to Aiden Oiring skating in on the right side wall. Oiring then moved the puck to the middle for a Daxon Rudolph onetimer, and the puck slipped underneath the elbow of the goaltender and rolled towards the goal line. A Blades defender knocked the puck into the net trying to fish it away from the crease, with Dube’s stick right behind it, but Rudolph had his fifth of the playoffs.

After 1: Raiders 4 – 1 Blades, 15-4 Raiders

Both teams were denied once on the powerplay in the first period, but the Blades used an early one in the second to build up some momentum. It took halfway through the period for it to pay off, but it eventually did when Hunter Laing tried a wraparound from behind the net. He was stopped, but a scrum for the puck insued, and eventually Laing found it again to tuck it home and reduce the gap to two goals at 11:39.

Then on their second powerplay of the period, the Blades scored again. At 15:30, the puck came to Blades captain Tyler Parr skating off the left wall and into the middle of the slot. He pulled the trigger, and Parr had his first point of the series to bring the Blades to within one.

In the final minute of the period however, the lone Raiders forward without a goal in the playoffs yet scored a goal that calmed his team down. After the puck was pinned to the wall between the benches, Max Heise collected the puck out of the pile and skated down the left wall, suddenly on a 2-on-1. Heise looked to the middle, saw he had a man with him, but instead fired a wrist shot short side right under the bar for his first goal of the playoffs at 19:03.

After 2: Raiders 5 – 3 Blades, shots 16-9 Blades, 24-20 Raiders overall

The third period was by far the most defensive of the series with only 12 shots on goal between the two teams. The Blades did miss a chance to get back within a goal when Hunter Laing sent a back door tip wide the far side of the goal. Another interesting moment saw Benett Kelly get stuck on the ice without a stick for a time, but just a moment after he got a stick from Jonah Sivertson, Kelly then cleared the puck away from the side of the goal.

The Blades would get the goaltender pulled and put some pressure on the Raiders in the final minutes of their season, but it was too little and too late until the Raiders captain Justice Christensen was able to hold the puck on the wall until time expired.

FINAL: Raiders 5 – 3 Blades, shots 6-6, 30-26 Raiders overall

For the first time since 2005, the Raiders have swept a playoff series against the Saskatoon Blades, which is also the last time either team had swept the other. It’s also the Raiders fifth series win over the Blades, making the score in history 5-4 Raiders.

With 5G-7A-12P through nine games of the playoffs, Daxon Rudolph leads the Raiders through the first two rounds. He’s followed by Braeden Cootes (5G-6A-11P) and Brayden Dube (3G-8A-11P).

The offence has been incredibly spread out. Having dressed 13 different forwards in nine games, Maddix McCagherty and Max Heise were the last two fowards needed to score for all 13 to have a goal in the playoffs. Including the six defencemen that have dressed, there are just two of the 19 Raiders to play in the playoffs without a goal yet, those being Benett Kelly and Justice Christensen.

From the first Blades goal of the game and dating back to the Feb 14 matchup between the Raiders and Blades, the Raiders managed to hold the Blades without an even strength goal for a total of 383 minutes and 58 seconds, or a little over 19 periods of hockey.

The Raiders will now wait until next week to take on the Medicine Hat Tigers in the Eastern Conference Final.

by Nick Nielsen

Raiders sweep Blades out of second round, move on to face Tigers

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